John Cena: I Supposed To Win And Lose My 17th World Championship At SummerSlam 2021 Before Brock Lesnar Was Booked

Original plans would’ve seen John Cena break the record at SummerSlam 2021.

At SummerSlam 2021, Universal Champion Roman Reigns put his title on the line against John Cena in a clash between two of the industry’s biggest ever stars. At the time, ‘The Tribal Chief’ was only around a year into his reign on top, but many didn’t want to write Cena off as he eyed his 17th world championship in Las Vegas. As it happened, Reigns would retain the gold, being confronted by Brock Lesnar after the match. However, we now know that the outcome could’ve been completely different.

Appearing on No-Contest Wrestling, Cena revealed that he was originally pencilled in to both win and lose his 17th world championship on the same night at SummerSlam 2021, saying Brock Lesnar’s return changed plans.

“That night was supposed to go very different. In the last moment, we had a surprise guest booked and he came out after the match was over. Brock. They didn’t they didn’t secure Brock until 5:00 PM that day. I was going to win 17. We were going to have someone come out and restart the match and Roman was going to take it back. The way we put together the match was we were going to give them a hell of a match, everything out the door, no rules, no nothing, tons of finishers, all this stuff because I was going to win and then Roman was going to take it back. So you have this hard-fought battle and then through a nefarious set of rules, match is restarted. Then we secure Brock and TR comes and said, ‘I need to see you. We’re switching the finish.’ ‘To what?’ Roman over.’ ‘Yep.’ ‘Clean.’ Yep.’ ‘Okay, what do you want to do?’ ‘Let me just talk to Roman and Paul.’ I go in, they’re like, ‘You got the news?’ I said, ‘I got the news.’ ‘What do we do?’ I said, ‘One Spear, that’s it. Whatever match you want to have, that’s fine. You beat me with your finish once.’ I love Paul. Paul Heyman has been a great mentor. He gets it and he recognizes somebody who sees that it’s not about them, it’s about the story. This is going to make Roman better because they’re they’re having him win so he can go on to bigger and better things. And it switched right there. We’re on the west coast, so it’s like an hour before the thing. It happens to everyone. It happens from the top of the card down to the bottom. They will switch. They will cut your time. They will give you different creative. It happens all the time. So I didn’t flip out. When Travis didn’t want to do it anymore, when Rock chose to go another way. It happens. I saw Steve Austin leave. I saw him get fired. I was there when they fired him in Atlanta. It happens all the time. But I was supposed to win 17 that night.”

-John Cena

Cena would go on to win his 17th world championship at WrestleMania 41, famously turning heel at Elimination Chamber just over a month prior to his title match. His 105-day reign as Undisputed WWE Champion ended at the hands of former title holder Cody Rhodes at SummerSlam, and it was here that Brock Lesnar would return to WWE to confront the now retired star. While Cena’s record-breaking title win could’ve come years earlier, ‘The Beast Incarnate’ emerging after his loss providing a small aspect of symmetry between the axed plans and what ended up happening down the line.

On the topic of WWE changing plans for John Cena, he revealed elsewhere in the interview who he was originally scheduled to face at Crown Jewel instead of AJ Styles. You can read more about that here.

As always, we’ll aim to provide any further updates on the original plans for John Cena and Roman Reigns as soon as we hear more.

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